Triad Confederate statue ownership uncertain amid removal row

In a Monday, Jan. 30, 2012 photo, the Confederate monument at the old Forsyth County Courthouse in Winston-Salem, appears to stand on the grounds of the courthouse, and not on the right-of-way for the public sidewalk. Forsyth County is selling its old courthouse building, but hasn't decided what to do with the statue of a Confederate soldier standing sentinel on the square for more than a century. (AP Photo/Winston-Saelm Journal, David Rolfe)

WINSTON-SALEM — Questions about the ownership of a Confederate monument that city officials in Winston-Salem want gone have arisen just days before the city-imposed deadline for removal. In a Jan. 25 letter, the United Daughters of the Confederacy’s North Carolina chapter asked Winston-Salem’s city attorney for a 60-day delay on filing legal action to force the removal. The city had issued a Jan. 31 deadline.

The UDC has previously claimed ownership of the statue, but recently unearthed news accounts have drawn questions over who owns the statue. The UDC wants a delay to resolve who actually owns the monument and whether the state’s monument protection law applies.